B987 


IRLF 


SB 


YC   16288 


MEMORIAL    SKETCH 


LIFE  AND  LITERARY  LABORS 


Evert  Augustus  Duyckinck, 


READ    BEFORE    THE 


NEW  YORK  HISTORICAL  SOCIETY. 


THE   SEVENTH   DAY    OF   JANUARY,    1879, 


WILLIAM    ALLEN    BUTLER. 


\ 


\ 


NEW  YORK : 

EVENING  POST  STEAM  PRESSES,  208  BROADWAY,  CORNER  FULTON  STREET. 

1879. 


MEMORIAL    SKETCH 


LIFE  AND  LITERARY  LABORS 


Evert  Augustus  Duyckinck, 


RKAD    BBFO&K    THE 


NEW  YORK  HISTORICAL  SOCIETY, 


THE   SEVENTH    DAY    OF   JANUARY,    1879, 


WILLIAM    ALLEN    BUTLER. 

V 


NEW  YORK : 

NING  POST  STEAM  PRESSES,  208  BROADWAY,  CORNER  FULTON  STREET, 

1879, 


At  a  Stated  Meeting  of  the  New  York  Historical  Society, 
held  in  its  hall,  on  Tuesday  evening,  Jannary  7,  1879. 

The  Executive  Committee  reported  that  Mr.  William  Allen 
Butler,  on  the  invitation  of  the  Committee,  had  prepared,  and 
would  now  read  a  paper  on  the  life  and  literary  labors  of  the 
late  Evert  A.  Duyckinck. 

On  its  conclusion,  Mr.  John  Austin  Stevens  submitted  the 
following  resolution : 

Resolved,  That  the  thanks  of  the  Society  be  and  hereby  are 
presented  to  Mr.  Butler,  for  the  graceful,  eloquent  and  appro- 
priate tribute  to  our  late  lamented  friend  Mr.  Duyckinck,  read 
this  evening,  and  that  a  copy  be  requested  for  the  archives  of 
the  Society. 

Extract  from  the  minutes. 

ANDREW  WARNER, 

Recording  Secretary. 


NOTE.— Mr.  ]^£]dtf»k^emte$ed*$$o  rost,  August  13th,  1878. 
Mr.  Butler  was  obliged' to  d&aatRse  ills  c::ccJlen,t  paper  in  order 
that  it  might  be  printed  in  the  Evening  X>s£,*V*ol.  78,  January 
9th,  1879, 


A  Memorial  Paper  Eead  Before  the 
New  York  Historical  Society, 
Tuesday,  January  7,  1879,  by 
William  Allen  Butler. 


Iu  attempting  a  sketch  of  the  life  and  literary 
labors  of  Evert  A.  Duyckinck  I  dismiss,  at  the 
outset,  any  misgivings  as  to  the  degree  of  general 
interest  attaching  to  a  career  whose  daily  course 
came  so  little  under  public  observation  and 
whose  chosen  aims  were  so  far  removed  from  the 
ordinary  pursuits  of  men.  At  first  thought  the 
life  of  a  scholar  passed  chiefly  among  his  books 
and  marked  by  an  avoidance  of  society,  presents 
few  points  of  attraction  and  may  seem  to 
furnish  little  material  for  even  a  brief  biographi- 
cal notice.  But  the  friend  whose  memory  we 
honor  was  not  a  mere  recluse,  living  a  selfish  life 
of  intellectual  ease.  He  was  a  faithful 
and  life-long  worker.  If  his  field  of 
labor  was  retired  it  was  no  less 
the  scene  of  constant  and  patient  toil ;  if  he  pre- 
ferred the  quiet  of  his  books  and  the  companion- 
ship of  their  authors  to  the  stir  of  active  life  and 
the  social  intercourse  of  the  world,  it  was  not  to 
hide  or  bury  the  talents  committed  to  his  keep- 
ing. In  his  self -chosen  seclusion  he  was  always 
contributing  his  measure  of  honest  work  to  that 
true  commonwealth  of  letters  in  which  there  is 
no  conflict  between  the  capital  of  intellectual 
gifts  or  acquirements  and  the  labor  of  brain  and 
hand,  but  where  all  are  co-workers,  each  in  his 
own  sphere,  for  the  advancement  of  the  best 
thought  and  intelligence  of  the  race. 

Evert  Augustus  Duyckinck,  the  son  of  Evert 
Duyckinck  and  Harriet  June,  was  born  in  the 
city  of  New  York  November  23,  1816.  His 
family  name  was  conspicuous  in  the  list  of  the 
early  Dutch  settlers  in  this  part  of  the  country. 

Evert  Duyckinck,  the  second  of  the  name,  who 
married  Elsie  Meyer,  February  3,  1704,  settled 
during  the  later  colonial  times  at  Raritan  Land- 
ing, New  Jersey.  Of  the  nine  children  of  Evert 
and  Elsie  Duyckinck,  the  third,  Christopher,  was 
actively  engaged  during  the  Revolutionary  War 


M165526 


(Q  Aid  of  the  struggle  for  independence.  His  son 
1  Evert,  the  eldest  of  seven  children  and  the  father 
of  the  subject  of  the  present  memorial  sketch, 
became  a  resident  of  the  city  of  New  York 
about  the  beginning  of  the  present  century,  and 
engaged  in  the  business  of  a  publisher  and  book- 
seller. His  house,  No.  9  Old  Slip,  and  his  store  in 
Water  street,  adioining  it  in  the  rear, 
were  well  known  to  the  residents  of 
old  New  York,  by  whom  he  was 
held  in  high  esteem  during  his  thirty  or  forty 
years  of  active  business  life.  He  gave  to  Messrs. 
J.  &  J.  Harper  the  first  order  they  ever  received 
for  book-printing.  It  was  for  two  thousand 
copies  of  Seneca's  Morals,  a  large  edition  for  the 
time,  and  considering  the  subject  perhaps  larger 
than  could  be  disposed  of  in  these  degenerate  days 
by  any  of  our  modern  publishers  with  all  their 
increased  appliances  of  trade. 

A  pleasant  allusion  to  the  veteran  publisher 
was  made  in  a  letter  of  Diedrich  Knickerbocker 
published  in  the  American  Citizen,  New  York, 
January  23,  1810,  not  included  in  any  collection 
of  Washington  Irving's  works,  but  reprinted  in 
Mr.  Stevens's  .Magazine  of  American  History  for 
May,  1878.  In  this  letter  the  veracious  historian 
of  New  York  expresses  his  regret  that 
his  work  had  not  been  published  by  his 
much  esteemed  friend  Mr.  Evert  Duy- 
ckinck,  "a  lineal  descendant  from  one  of 
the  ancient  heroes  of  the  Manhattoes  whose 
grandfather  and  my  grandfather  were  just  like 
brothers."  It  appears  from  a  passing  allusion  in 
a  note-book  of  his  son  Evert  that  a  love  of  do- 
mestic retirement  and  quiet  was  characteristic  of 
the  family.  Speaking  of  the  luxury  of  a  wood 
fire  in  Paris,  he  says:  "  A  wood  fire  will  always 
be  associated  by  me  with  home  and  my  best  early 
days  by  my  father's  and  mother's  fireside.  My 
father  had  a  Dutch  tenacity  to  domestic  habits 
that  no  friction  of  travel  will  rub  out  from  me 
either.  In  his  store  in  Water  street  he  kept 
heaped-up  fires — a  back  log  in  the  morning  like 
a  hogshead.  In  the  ashes,  after  dinner,  a 
a  few  Carolina  potatoes  were  commonly  buried, 
where  they  lay  heaped  up  like  the  tombs  of  Ajax 
and  Patroclus.  In  the  evening,  over  the  embers, 
my  uncle  Long  always  came  to  talk  over  the 
business  of  the  day,  while  I  kept  close  to  the  cor- 
ner, rarely  venturing  to  go  among  the  dark 
shades  at  the  further  end  of  the  room." 

The  two  sons  and  only  children  of  Evert 
Duyckinck,  the  publisher,  were  Evert  Augustus 
and  George  Long,  the  latter  named  after  the 
uncle  just  mentioned.  The  two  boys  grew  up  in 


that  daily  contact  with  books  and  literary  asso- 
ciations which,  to  a  mind  naturally  intelligent, 
is  often  the  most  potent  influence  in  determining 
the  pursuits  of  after  years.  Evert  was  gradu- 
ated from  Columbia  College  in  the  class  of  1835, 
at  the  age  of  nineteen,  and  afterward  spent  two 
years  in  the  law  office  of  the  eminent  jurist  and 
practitioner  John  Anthou. 

He  was  admitted  to  the  bar  in  1837,  but  the 
profession  of  the  law  presented  no  attractions  to* 
his  retiring  and  contemplative  nature.  His 
strong  bias  for  literary  studies  and  pursuits,  con- 
spicuous during  his  college  course,  had  been 
shown  in  his  contributions  to  leading  literary 
journals  published  in  New  York.  For  Park  Ben- 
jamin's American  M onthly  he  wrote  some  charm- 
ing papers  under  the  title  "Felix  Merry's  Fire- 
side Essays. "  He  soon  afterward  became  a  regu- 
lar contributor  to  the  New  York  Review  and 
Quarterly  Church  Journal,  for  which  he  wrote 
reviews  of  the  poetical  works  of  Crabbe,  Mrs. 
Hemans,  George  Herbert  and  Goldsmith,  beside 
many  other  critical  pieces.  His  love  of  old  Eng- 
lish literature,  the  department  of  study  in  which 
he  always  delighted,  was  exhibited  in  an  article 
in  one  of  the  earlier  numbers  of  the  same  review, 
in  which  his  name  is  associated  as  a  contributor 
with  those  of  Chancellor  Kent  and  Bishop  Mc- 
Ilvaine. 

In  the  autumn  of  1838  he  left  home  for  a  year 
of  travel  in  Europe,  which  he  made  not  merely 
an  opportunity  for  gratifying  the  curiosity  of  an 
American,  but  largely  a  means  of  verifying  by 
his  own  observation  what  he  had  learned  in  his 
studies  of  the  life,  manners  and  associations  of 
the  old  world. 

"  I  desire,"  he  says  in  the  opening  pages  of  the 
diary  Irom  which  a  quotation  has  already  been 
given,  "  to  traverse  Europe  and  look  upon  it  with 
tbe  eye  of  the  Past,  as  Howell,  or  Evelyn  or  Wot- 
ton  travelled  in  the  seventeenth  century."  He 
was  most  fortunate  in  forming  the  acqaintance 
in  Paris  of  Mr  Harmanus  Bleeker  of  Albany, 
an  eminent  lawyer  and  scholar,  a  descendant, 
like  himself,  of  a  good  Holland  stock,  who  was 
about  to  visit  the  land  of  his  ancestors  under  the 
most  favorable  auspices.  He  invited  Mr.  Duy- 
ckinck  and  his  friend  and  fellow-traveller 
James  W.  Beekman  to  accompany  him ; 
an  invitation  gladly  accepted.  Mr.  Blee- 
ker was  versed  in  the  Dutch  lan- 
guage and  literature,  and  was  well  known 
in  Holland,  where  soon  afterward,  during 
the  Presidency  of  Mr.  Van  Buren,  he  re- 
presented the  (Jmted  States  a*  Minister  at  the 
Hague.  "  As  honest  as  Ha  rmauus  Bleeker "  was 
a  phrase  of  John  Randolph  which  conveyed  a 
sincere  tribute  to  one  of  whom  Duyckinck  says: 
"He  follows  truth  fearlessly  in  everything." 
He  proved  a  most  congenial  and  instructive  com- 
panion in  travel,  delighting  his  juniors  with  his 
good  sense  and  the  results  of  his  long  experience 
at  the  Bar  and  in  public  life  and  with  his  fund  of 


6 


anecdotes,  of  which  Duyckinck  testifies  '*  they 
are  always  good  and  always  new  and  rare,  and 
many  an"  hour  of  travel  have  they  beguiled  on 
the  long,  straight  roads  of  the  Low  Countries." 

The  touri*ts  entered  Holland  at  Grootzun- 
dert,  a  port  on  the  frontier  of  Belgium.  The 
appearance  in  their  passports  of  such  honest 
Dutch  names  as  '•  Bleeker,"  •' Duyckinck"  and 
"Beekman,"  aided,  no  doubt,  by  the  ingenuous 
countenances  of  their  proprietors,  elicited  a  cour- 
teous waiver  of  Custom  House  scrutiny,  and  the 
freedom  of  the  Netherlands  seems  to  have  been 
conferred  upon  them  without  any  troublesome 
formalities.  A  private  audience  ot  the  King  and 
a  ball  at  the  palace  of  the  Prince  of  Orange  were 
part  of  a  round  of  entertainments  and  hospitali- 
ties from  which  Duyckinck  was  disposed,  under 
the  impulse  of  his  retiring  and  independent  dis- 
position, to  draw  back.  "  I  began,"  he  says,  "  to 
question  my  position  when  I  found  Mr.  Bleeker 
received  by  the  great  lords  of  the  state,  and  my- 
self included  in  the  invitations.  I  dislike  to  re- 
ceive any  attention  to  which  I  have  not  some 
right  in  myself.  It  sacrifices  independence.  But 
1  was  fairly  invited  by  Mr.  Bleeker  to  accom- 
pany him  as  a  fellow- traveller.  He  draws  these 
attentions  upon  us.  For  myself,  I  am  a  looker- 
on  in  Vienna." 

Few  lookers-on  ever  brought  to  the  quiet  task 
of  observation  more  good  sense  or  a  keener  ap- 
preciation of  whatever  was  worthy  of  note. 
His  rare  opportunities  for  seeing  life  in  Holland 
at  its  best  were  well  improved.  His  journal,  in 
the  neat,  firm  handwriting  expressive  of  his  ex- 
act method  and  nicety  of  taste,  is  a  series  of 
sketches  drawn  from  nature  and  society  with  a 
vivid  charm  of  expression  in  their  descriptions  of 
scenes  and  incidents  of  travel,  which  reminds  one 
of  the  easy  grace  of  Irving,  and  in  their 
pictures  of  social  life  and  personal  traits  of 
the  quick  vivacity  of  Hoi-ace  Walpole.  In 
company  with  Mr.  Bleener,  Duyckinck  made 
a  thorough  exploration  of  all  the  places  of  inter- 
est to  a  literary  man  and  a  Hollander  by  de- 
scent. In  a  book  of  heraldry  at  the  house  of 
Baron  Westreenan,  a  noted  antiquarian,  they 
found  their  respective  coats-of-arms,  and  at  the 
hospitable  tables  of  the  burghers  of  Amsterdam 
and  the  Hague  a  paternal  welcome.  There,  as 
the  journal  attests,  "  eternal  amity  was  sworn 
between  Holland  and  America;  and  if,"  says 
Duyckinck,  "  the  ocean  that  separates  us  were  of 
wine  (like  that  in  the  Verse  Historial  of  Lucian) 
these  Dutchmen  would  drink  it  up  for  the  sake 
of  a  closer  union." 

It  is  curious  and  pleasant  to  observe  from  these 
notes  of  travel  in  Holland,  more  than  forty 
years  ago,  the  high  repute  in  which  the  best 
people  there  held  the  American  authors 
whose  works  were  familiar  to  them 
through  their  translation  into  Dutch.  With 
an  ignorance  as  to  the  condition  of  society  and 
manners  in  America  so  profound  that  the  ques- 
tion was  put  to  Duychinck  by  an  intelligent 
Hollander,  at  a  diplomatic  dinner,  whether  trav- 
ellers in  his  country  "subsisted  by  the  chase,'' 
they  were  yet  highly  appreciative  of  Irving's 
"  Columbus,3-'  Marshall's  "  Life  of  Washington  " 
and  Cooper's  novels.  Perhaps  these  last  had 


furnished  the  ground  for  the  apprehensions  of 
the  worthy  diner-out  that  in  case  he  visited  New 
Amsterdam  he  would  have  to  depend  for  his  sub- 
sistence upon  the  success  of  the  leather-stockings 
of  Manhattan  Island  in  bagging  their  daily 
game.  However  this  may  be,  the  same  kindly 
greeting  given  to  these  well-accredited  tourists 
was  accorded  to  the  works  of  their  countrymen — 
a  fact  which  loses  none  of  its  interest  in  the 
thought  that  this  was  long  before  the  history 
and  the  heroes  of  the  Netherlands  had  received 
their  best  commemoration  from  tue  pen  of  an 
American  scholar. 

But  pleasant  as  were  these  hospitalities,  it  is 
evident  that  the  ideal  life  which  our  traveller 
had  set  before  him  was  quite  different  from  one 
made  up  of  social  gaieties.  His  longing  for  quiet 
study  and  for  labor  in  his  chosen  lield  was  not 
dissipated.  A  characteristic  entry  in  his  jpiirnal 
betrays,  perhaps  quite  unconsciously  to  himself, 
his  ruling,  hereditary  passion  for  a  sequestered 
life.  Returning  from  a  stroll  in  the  deer  park, a 
favorite  resort  i  or  his  solitary  rambles  while  a 
resident  at  the  Hague,  he  writes:  "  If  I  were  a 
believer  in  the  ancient  transmigration,  I  would 
sigh  for  the  quiet,  ruminating,  contented  ideas  of 
a  well-au tiered  deer,  browsing  leisurely  along, 
and  watching  the  little  business  of  his  world 
around." 

After  leaving  Holland  in  April,  183^,  he  spent 
the  summer  and  autumn  in  England  and  Scot- 
land, returned  to  New  York  late  in  the  year  and 
renewed  at  once  his  cherished  associations  with 
his  books  and  literary  labors.  His  first  serious 
work  after  his  return  home  was  in  the  editorship 
in  conjunction  with  Mr.  Cornelius  Matthews  of 
a  monthly  journal,  the  Arcturus.  Mr.  William 
A.  Jones  was  also  engaged  in  this  enterprise,  and 
the  three  wrote  almost  all  the  articles.  It  ran 
through  three  volumes,  and  some  of  Duyckinck's 
best  work  was  done  in  this  magazine,  which  is 
not  inaptly  described  in  one  of  Tidgar  A.  Poe's 
brief  sketches  of  literary  men  as  a  "little  too 
good  to  enjoy  extensive  popularity." 

In  April,  1840,  he  married  Miss  Margaret  Wolfe 
Panton,  and  soon  afterward  took  up  his  perma- 
nent and  life-long  residence  at  No.  20  Clinton 
Place,  a  home  where  the  affections  of  wife 
and  children  and  kindred,  and  the  companionship 
of  friends,  all  found  their  springs  of  happiness  in 
his  unvarying  serenity  of  temper,  his  pure  and 
elevated  thought,  and  his  devotion  to  duty. 

In  the  early  part  of  1847  Mr.  Duyckinck  under- 
took the  editorship  of  the  Literary  World, 
a  weekly  journal  designed  as  a  vehicle  for  the 
best  criticism  on  books  and  art  and  the  inde- 
pendent and  impartial  treatment  of  all  topics 
relating  to  the  cultivation  of  letters. 

In  the  conduct  of  the  Literary  World  an  ele- 
vated and  inspiring  tone  was  conspicuous,  and 
Mr.  Duyckinck  drew  around  him  many  able  co- 
adjutors. It  was  at  this  time  I  saw  him  most 
frequently,  always  at  his  own  house — for  even 
then  he  mixed  very  little  in  society — where  I  was 
attracted  by  the  constant  presence  of  men  of 
mark  in  letters  and  art,  and  by  the  friendship 
subsisting  between  the- two  brothers  and  myself. 
The  evenings  in  his  library  will  long  be  remem- 
bered by  many  men  whose  ways  in  life  have 


widely  diverged  in  the  years  which  followed  the 
period  to  which  I  now  advert,  but  who  then 
were  fond  of  gathering  around  his  fireside, 
and  there  discussing  the  various  topics  of 
the  day,  or  listening  to  the  modest  but  always 
forcible  expression  of  his  critical  opinions,  or  the 
quiet  humor  of  his  narrative  of  some  incident  or 
reminiscence  which  gave  point  to  the  subject  of 
the  moment.  He  was  wholly  free  from  the  spirit 
of  detraction.  The  office  of  the  critic  was  not 
allied  in  his  view  with  the  partisanship  of  sDecial 
ideas  or  authors,  nor  was  its  chief  function  the 
suppression  of  rivals  or  the  extinction  of  the 
weak  and  feeble.  The  savagery  of  the  trenchant 
style  of  criticism  was  as  alien  to  his  idea  of  the 
true  sphere  of  the  literary  censor  as  it  was  to 
the  humanity  of  his  nature,  and  he  never 
turned  bis  pen  into  a  bludgeon  or  made 
it  the  instrument  of  any  selfish  or  unworthy  pur- 
pose. His  own  work  as  a  writer  was  always 
conscientious  and  complete.  To  extreme  delicacy 
of  taste  he  added  a  rare  grace  and  nicety  of  ex- 
pression and  a  certain  tact  in  the  handling  and 
exhibition  of  his  subject  which  gave  a  peculiar 
charm  to  what  he  wrote.  His  standard  both  as 
to  the  style  and  the  purpose  of  literary  composi- 
tion was  of  the  highest  character.  The  fine  phrase 
in  which  Horace  describes  the  accomplishments 
of  his  friend, 

"  *       *       *       *       *       ad  unguem 

Factus  homo," 

he  applied  as  the  highest  praise  of  a  well-written 
book.  It  must  be  finished  to  the  finger  nail  to 
meet  the  requirements  of  a  just  criticism,  and  to 
this  severe  test  he  sought  to  subject  his  own 
work  as  well  as  that  of  the  authors  on  whom  he 
sat  in  judgment. 

1  have  dwelt  on  this  period  of  his  career  be- 
cause it  marked  the  time  not  only  of  my  closest 
acquaintance  with  him  but  also  of  the  enforced 
cessation  of  our  constant  intercourse.  To  a  young 
man  called  by  necessity  and  choice  to  the  severer 
studies  and  active  duties  of  the  bar,  ambrosian 
nights  and  the  society  of  even  the  choicest  spirits 
in  literature  and  art  were  temptations  to  be 
shunned,  and  my  way  of  life  soon  ran  in  a  very 
different  path  from  his.  But  to  know  Duyckinck 
once  was  to  be  intimate  with  him  always;  and 
the  infrequent  meetings  of  later  years  were  in- 
variably on  the  unchanged  footing  of  our  first 
friendship.  To  turn  atdde  at  long  intervals 
from  the  daily  routine  of  life  and  its 
common  round  of  duties  to  revisit  him  in 
the  quiet  of  his  studies  was  as  when  one 
leaves  the  dusty  and  sun-struck  highway  to 
seek  in  some  neighboring  and  familiar  shade  and 
covert  the  spring  he  knows  is  hidden  under  the 
thicket  close  at  hand,  to  thrust  aside  the  inter- 
cepting branches  and  to  find  in  the  clear  peren- 
nial waters  the  same  refreshment  and  strength 
as  when  he  drank  them  first. 

The  Literary  World  was  continued  to  the  close 
of  1853.  The  experiment  of  a  purely  literary 
journal,  dependent  on  its  own  merits,  and  ap- 
pealing rather  to  the  sympathies  than  the  needs 
of  that  very  small  portion  of  the  public  which 
took  satisfaction  in  a  weekly  presentation  of  the 
progress  of  ideas  without  reference  to  their 
own  party  politics,  their  own  religious  de- 


nomination,  their  craving  for  continuous  fiction 
or  their  preference  for  woodcuts  and  caricatures, 
had  been  fairly  tried  and  the  result  was  not  en- 
couraging. The  Duyckincks  were  men  of  too 
much  sense  and  too  much  substance  to  pursue  a 
literary  enterprise  for  the  mere  sake  of  a  small 
corps  of  contributors,  however  brilliant,  or  a 
select  circle  of  readers,  however  appreciative. 
They  wisely  withdrew  from  the  field  of  news- 
paper competition,  recognising  that  inexorable 
law  of  supply  and  demand  which  less  responsible 
projectors  of  like  undertakings  so  often  ignore 
until  the  very  implements  and  paraphernalia  by 
which  they  sought  to  enlighten  the  world  and 
achieve  immortality  are  sold  under  a  chattel 
mortgage  or  a  sheriff's  execution. 

But  although  the  Literary  World  was  not  a 
permanent  success,  the  work  done  upon  it  was 
not  lost. 

There  is  this  difference  between  the  failures  of 
ventures  in  journalism  ,md  ordinary  business  i'e- 
verses,  that  while  the  types  and  presses  and  me- 
chanical appliances  by  Avhich  they  are  carried  on 
may  figure  in  a  bankruptcy  schedule  as  very  un- 
available assets,  the  written  words  to  which  they 
have  given  permanent  form  and  expression  on  the 
printed  page  remain  and  become  a  part  of  the 
great  body  of  literature  to  survive  and  to  find 
their  permanent  place  and  value  if  they  are  intrin- 
sically worthy  of  preservation.  Many  a  famous  or 
well-deserving  poem,  essay  or  article  has  first  seen 
the  light  as  a  contribution  to  some  short-lived 
magazine  or  journal  which  may  have  served  as  a 
kind  of  fire-escape  for  the  genius  imperilled  by  its 
destruction. 

After  the  Literary  World  had  ceased  to  exist 
Duyckinck  turned,  doubtless  with  a  sense  of  re- 
lief, to  the  more  congenial  labors  to  which  the  rest 
of  his  life  was  devoted  and  in  which  he  found  his 
best  sphere  as  a  scholar  and  expert  in  English  and 
American  literature— the  editing  of  books  of  per- 
manent value  and  the  preparation  of  works  of  his- 
tory and  biography.  In  1854  he  undertook,  with 
his  brother  and  under  arrangements  with  Mr. 
Charles  Scribner  as  its  publisher,  the  preparation 
of  the  Cyclopaedia  of  American  Literature,  a 
work  of  large  proportions,  demanding  most 
extensive  researches  and  a  thorough  ac- 
quaintance with  the  works  of  American  authors. 
The  design  of  the  Cyclopaedia  was  to  bring  to- 
gether, as  far  as  possible,  memorials  and  records 
of  the  writers  of  the  country  and  their  works  from 
the  earliest  period  to  the  present  day.  "  The  voice 
of  two  centuries  of  American  literature,"  says  the 
preface, u  may  well  be  worth  listening  to."  Two 
years  of  faithful  and  diligent  work  were  ex- 
pended upon  the  CydopEedia,  many  difficulties 
were  surmounted,  and  when  it  was  finally  com- 
pleted and  published  it  took  its  place  at  once  as 
the  standard  exposition  of  the  history  <  growth  and 
development  of  literature  in  America,  and  as  a 
monument  of  the  good  taste,  judgment  and  dis- 
crimination of  its  editors.  A  supplement  was 
added  by  Mr.  Duyckinck  in  18t>5.  after  the  death  of 
his  brother,  bringing  the  work  down  to  that  date. 
I  can  only  mention  briefly  the  leading  literary 
labors  which  followed  the  completion  of  the  Cyclo- 
paedia. In  185ti  Duyckinck  edited  the  "  Wit  and 
Wisdom  of  Sydney  Smith,  with  a  biographical  me- 
moir and  notes,"  In  1862  he  undertook  the  task  of 
£reparing  the  letter-press  for  the  "  National  Por- 
rait  Gallery  of  Eminent  Americans,"  published 
by  Messrs.  Johnson,  Fry  &  Co.,  a  series  of  bio- 
graphical sketches  and  portraits  forming  two 
quarto  volumes. 

This  work  had  a  very  extended  circulation,  the 
number  of  copies  sold  having  long  since  exceeded 


10 


one  hundred  thousand.  A  contemporary  "History 
of  the  War  for  the  Union  "  in  three  quarto  vol- 
umes, and  another  extensive  work,  "  Biographies 
of  Eminent  Men  and  Women  of  Europe  and 
America,"  were  written  by  him  for  the  same  pub- 
lishers. He  also  edited  for  them  a  "  History  of  the 
World"  in  four  quarto  volumes,  compiled  chiefly 
from  the  Encyclopaedia  Britannica  and  in  great 
part  by  his  son  George.  Less  elaborate  works 
were  the  editing1,  with  a  memoir  and  notes,  of  the 
"Poems  of  Philip  Frenau,"  the  American  edition 
of  the  "Poets  of  the  Nineteenth  Century,"  a 
memorial  of  John  Allan,  the  well-known  \c\v 
York  book  collector  (printed  by  the  Bradford 
Club),  commemoration  sketches  of  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Hawks,  Henry  T.  Tuckennan  and  James  W.  Beek- 
man,  read  before  the  New  York  Historical  society 
and  printed  by  it,  and  similar  memorials  of  John 
David  Wolfe  and  Samuel  G.  Drake,  the  last  named 
for  the  American  Ethnological  Society.  Immedi- 
ately after  the  death  of  Washington  Irving  he 
gathered  together  and  published  in  a  single  vol- 
ume an  interesting  collection  of  anecdotes  and 
traits  of  the  great  author  under  the  title  "  Irvingi- 
ana." 

He  was  fully  equipped  for  the  best  critical  and 
biographical  work.  He  knew  the  whole  field  of 
English  literature  "  as  seamen  know  the  sea."  The 
authors  of  the  Elizabethan  age  were  as  familiar  to 
him  as  any  of  their  successors  of  the  Victorian  era. 
Those  "old  fields,"  out  of  which  comes  so  much  of 
the  "  new  corn  "  of  modern  thought  and  expression 
were  to  him  like  the  woodland  and  meadows 
around  an  ancestral  homestead.  In  the  general 
range  of  literature  and  on  most  of  its  special  sub- 
jects his  knowledge  was  complete  as  to  siuthors 
and  the  prooer  critical  estimate  of  their  works  and 
the  various  editions  through  which  they  had 
passed:  and  thus  as  scholar,  critic  and  bibliograph- 
er he  was  a  standard  authority.  I  know  of  no  one 
to  whom  any  vexed  questions  on  points  of  litenirv 
inquiry  could  have  been  as  safely  referred  for  de- 
cision without  further  appeal  as  in  a  tribunal  of 
last  resort.  Nor  do  1  know  any  scholar  of  our 
country  better  fitted  by  natural  disposition  and 
temperament,  by  study  and  rese-.vrch,  by  constant 
practice  as  a  writer,  by  experience  as  journalist 
and  editor,  and  by  thorough  magnanimity  and  im- 
partiality of  judgment,  to  discharge  the"dutv  and 
fulfil  the  trust  of  a  literary  critic. 

His  collection  of  books  and  his  use  of  them  was 
characteristic  of  the  man  anu  indicated  at  once  his 
Catholic  and  conservative  taste,  embracing  rare 
and  particular  editions  of  books  of  which  he  knew 
the  history  and  contents,  special  volumes  to  be 
prized  for  their  peculiar  place  in  literary  annals, 
illustrated  works,  selected  not  so  much  for  their 
artistic  merit  as  with  reference  to  the  aid  which 
the  pencil  brought  to  the  text  of  the  author.  He 
was  careful  as  to  the  condition  and  binding  of  his 
books,  less  as  a  matter  of  taste  than  with  reference 
to  the  desert  of  the  books  themselves,  and  nothing 
in  his  library  was  for  show.  In  fact  no  one  but  »n 
intimate  friend  knew  the  number  of  his  books  or 
their  value.  They  were  kept  in  various  rooms  of 
his  house,  and  many  of  them  out  of  sight ;  but  they 
were  always  at  hand  when  needed  for  reference, 
or  in  aid  of  anv  theme  of  discussion  or  of  the 
offices  of  friendship,  and  as  occasion  required  he 
would,  like  the  householder  ~of  the  Scripture, 
bring  forth  "  out  of  his  treasure  things  new  and 
old."  It  is  characteristic  of  the  modesty  of 
the  man  that  his  library,  the  object  of  his 
constant  solicitude  and  of  his  just  pride,  should 
receive  special  and  fitting  recognition  only 
after  his  death.  He  knew  the  great  im- 
portance of  preserving  intact  a  collection 
which  had  grown  up  as  the  result  of  the  judicious 
and  careful  selection  of  books  in  this  country 
and  in  Europe  by  himself  and  his  brother 


1 1 


during  a  period  of  nearly  forty  years, 
and  he  wisely  determined  to  provide  for 
their  permanent  deposit  in  the  alcoves 
of  the  fine  public  library  with  which  Mr.  Lenox  has 
enriched  the  city.  There  the  spirit  of  the  gentle 
and  refined  scholar  will  seem  to  abide  among  the 
the  books  he  loved, which  will  perpetuate  his  name 
and  be  the  lasting  memorial  of  his  taste  and 
learning 

The  home  of  which  I  have  spoken  as  the  centre 
of  so  many  domestic  affections  was  visited  by  re- 
peated and  gi-ievous  sorrows.  All  the  younger 
members  ot  the  household  were,  one  by  one,  re- 
moved by  death ;  the  sisters  by  marriage  to  whom 
he  was  as  an  elder  brother,  the  brother  to  whom 
he  was  as  a  second  father  and  whose  fine  reveren- 
tial spirit  arid  intellectual  taste  found  expression 
in  the  memoirs  of  the  English  Church  worthier, 
Kerr  and  Latimer  and  Herbert,  and  the  three  sons 
whose  promise  and  performance  were  full 
of  satisfaction.  The  youngest,  already  al- 
luded to,  for  his  share  in  the  preparation  of  the 
"History  of  the  World,"  died  in  the  twenty-sev- 
enth year  of  his  age.  The  oldest,  Evert,  lived  only 
sixteen  years :  he  had  developed  a  fine  taste  and 
manly  spirit  and  was  the  constant  companion  of 
his  father,  to  whom  he  was  specially  endeared. 
The  second  son,  Henry,a  graduate  of  Columbia  Col- 
It  -ire  and  a  clergyman  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal 
Church,  was  cut  off  in  his  early  prime  at  the  post 
of  duty,  a  victim  to  his  intrepid  devotion  to  the 
work  of  beneficence  and  Christian  philanthropy, 
to  which  he  had  consecrated  himself. 

These  heavy  burdens  of  domestic  grief  were 
borne  with  a  soirit  of  Christian  fortitude.  Mr 
Duyckinck's  religious  views  were  simple  and  firm, 
resting  on  a  thorough  acquiescence  in  the  verities 
of  the  Christian  faith  as  expressed  by  the  church 
he  revered  and  of  which  he  was  a  devout  mem- 
ber. ''The  trreat  background  of  his  character," 
writes  the  Rev.  Dr.  Morgan,  the  rector  of 
St.  Thomas's  Church,  in  which  he  was  many  years 
a  vestryman,  "was  his  purity  or  exquisite  deli- 
cacy of  organization.  It  led  to  extreme  modesty 
and  a  want  of  even  moderate  self-assertion,  but 
for  the  most  part  it  was  his  glory.  His  pure  mind 
and  taste  marked  him  in  everything.  The  thing 
which  fell  specially  under  my  notice  was  his  pains- 
taking diligence  and  fidelity  in  common,  humdrum 
duties.  He  was  Clerk  of  the  Vestry  of  St.  Thomas's, 
and  I  have  still  in  my  possession  some  of  the  blank 
books  which  he  filled  with  minutes  and  memoran- 
da. It  must  have  cost  him  a  great  deal  of  labor, 
and  consumed  much  precious  time,  but  it  was  con- 
scientiously done,  even  to  the  copying  of  long 
specifications.  But  after  all  the  mind  reverts  to 
his  quiet,  studious  habits,  and  his  long  communion 
with  the  bestmen  and  minds  of  "all  time." 

In  a  like  view  the  Rev.  Dr.  Rylance,  rector  of  St. 
Mark's  Church,  where  ho  worshipped  up  to  the 
time  of  his  last  illness,  speaks  of  him  as  a  "  rare 
illustration  of  what  Wordsworth  calls  'natural 
piety'  beautified  and  hallowed  by  the  wisdom 
which  is  from  above.  My  visits  to  him  as  a  pastor," 
he  writes,  "  were  always  rewarded  by  some  in- 
crease of  light  or  inspiration  to  my  own  mind  or 
heart.  But  only  as  the  last  mortal  hour  approacned 
did  the  singular  excellence  of  Mr.  Duyckinck's 
Christian  character  reveal  itself.  Through  the 
long  and  painful  decay  of  the  outer  man  the  inner 
man  was  renewed  day  by  day.  No  complaint  or 
murmur  did  I  ever  hear  from  his  lips,  but  the 
same  chastened  resignation  ever  showed  itself  as  I 
approached  the  sufferer  to  minister  what  little 
comfort  I  could  in  his  time  of  need.  He  would 
speak  naturally  and  with  an  earnestness  of  manner 
not  usual  with  him  of  the  future  life  and  of  the 
good  hope  guarantied  by  the  Gospel." 

In  the  last  literary  work  undertaken  by  Mr. 
Duyckinck,  and  which  was  completed  only  a  short 


12 


time  before  illness  prevented  him  from  further 
labor,  he  was  associated  with  Mr.  Bryant.  The 
same  publisher,  for  whom  he  had  been  engaged 
on  the  most  important  works  already  noticed,  pro- 
jected a  popular  edition  of  the  "  Plays  of  Shake- 
speare," and  the  work  of  preparing-  and  anno- 
tating- the  text  was  undertaken,  at  their  request, 
by  Mr.  Bryant  and  Mr.  Duyckinck.  The  editions 
of  Shakespeare  are  almost  innumerable,  and  so 
are  the  names  of  Shakespearian  editors  and  com- 
mentators, but  seldom  has  the  task  of  arranging 
and  setting  in  order  that  vasl  array  of  dramatic- 
scenes  and  persons  whose  ''infinite  variety" 
'•  age  cannot  wither  nor  custom  stale,"  been  confid- 
ed to  scholars  more  competent  for  its  worthy  execu- 
tion. For  the  general  supervision  of  the  work  and 
the  special  duty  of  scrutinizing  the  text  when  pre- 
pared and  of  its  final  revision,  Mr.  Bryant  was  of 
all  American  authors  best  fitted  by  his  trained 
skill  in  the  poetic  art,  his  wonderful  memory,  em- 
bracing so  much  of  literature  and  of  literary  an- 
nals illustrative  of  the  Shakespearian  text,  his  se- 
vere taste,  his  long  labor  in  the  rendering  of  the 
Homeric  poems  into  English  verse,  his  large  ex- 
perience of  life,  his  elevated  and  serene  tempera- 
ment which  made  him  so  much  a  lover  of  nature 
and  the  human  race  and  so  little  dependent  on 
companionship  with  individual  men.  These  were 
rare  qualifications  for  the  semi-judicial  function 
of  determining  the  best  and  truest  rendering  pf 
the  very  many  obscure  and  douotful  passages  of 
Shakespeare  over  which  scholars  and  crit- 
ics have  so  long  contended.  To  Duyckinck 
was  confided  the  severer  and  laborious 
task  of  the  first  preparation  of  the  text,  the  colla- 
tion from  the  various  readings  and  editions  of  the 
best  version,  and  the  annotation  and  arrangement 
of  the  whole  work.  The  nature  and  extent  of  their 
respective  shares  in  the  editorial  work  are  clearly 
defined  in  the  manuscript  preface  by  Mr.  Bryant, 
a  portion  of  which  has  recently  been  made  public 
in  the  columns  of  the  EVENING  POST,  and  in  which 
he  says : 

"  Among  the  variations  in  the  text  in  the  old 
copies  called  readings  are  many  the  genuineness 
of  which  is  matter  of  dispute  among  commenta- 
tors. *  *  *  In  selecting  the  most  authentic  of 
this  class  I  should  not  have  been  willing  to  rely  on 
my  own  judgment  and  opportunity,  and  have, 
therefore,  sought  the  co-operation  of  Mr.  Duyck- 
inck, whose  studious  habits  of  research  and  dis- 
crimination fitted  him  in  a  peculiar  manner  for 
the  task.  With  the  assurance  of  his  assistance  I 
undertook  the  work,  and  it  is  due  to  him  to  say 
that  although  every  syllable  of  this  edition  has 
passed  under  my  eye  and  been  considered  and  ap- 
proved by  me,  the  preliminary  labor  in  the  re- 
vision and  annotation  has  been  performed  by  him." 
It  is  pleasant  to  think  that  his  last  labor  was  one 
so  congenial  to  his  tastes.  Hindered  by  no  calls  to 
alien  or  disturbing  duties  or  rough  competitions  in 
the  outer  world,  it  was  pursued  in  the  seclusion 
which  he  loved  among  the  ample  sources  of  aid 
and  illu  stration  in  the  books  by  which  he  was  sur- 
rounded. From  the  first  scene  to  the  last  he  went 
page  by  page,  line  by  line  through  all  the  dramas 
which  the  world  accepts  under  the  name  of  Shake- 
speare, with  the  patient  and  conscientious  care  im- 
posed by  the  nature  of  the  work  and  his  sense 
of  duty,  and,  as  we  may  well  imagine,  with  some- 
thing of  the  reverent  devotion  to  the  minutest  de- 
tails which  a  mediasval  monk  might  have  given  to 
the  task  of  illuminating  the  record  of  the  legend 
of  a  patron  saint.  The  labor  thus  delighted  in  was 
often  an  antidote  to  sorrow  and  pain  and  a  source 
of  strength  and  comfort.  He  showed  me  on  one 
occasion  with  evident  satisfaction  the  portion  of 
the  work  he  had  in  hand,  and  to  an  intimate  friend 
in  an  interview  near  the  close  of  his  life,  when  he 
was  suffeiing  great  pain,  his  patient  endurance 


found  relief    in  words    supplied    by   the   great 
dramatist, 

"  Come  what  come  may 
Time  and  the  hour  run  through  the  roughest  day." 

The  review  thus  taken  of  this  life  of  literary  la- 
bor presents  a  succession  of  unobtrusive  and  yet 
most  faithful  and  persevering  efforts.  Under  the 
spur  of  necessity  or  by  the  help  of  early  associa- 
tion with  some  leading-  and  liberal  publisher  who 
could  have  discerned  the  practical  uses  of  his  pe- 
culiar gifts  he  might  perhaps  have  done  greater 
things  and  made  his  name  more  famous.  But  it 
was  better  that  he  should  have  pursued  his  own 
chosen  path  and  left  us  this  rare  instance  of  an  un- 
spoiled scholarly  life,  passed  in  the  midst  of  a  great 
commercial  metropolis,  which,  with  all  its  varied 
attractions  and  temptations,  could  not  divert  him 
from  the  pursuits  to  which  he  was  devoted  as  by 
an  irrevocable  vow.  We  are  under  a  great  obliga- 
tion to  the  scholar  who  thus  attests  his  fealty  to 
the  cause  of  letters.  In  a  great  city,  with  its  count- 
less and  ceaseless  activities,  where  tjae  participants 
in  the  daily  round  of  duties,  from  the  drudgery 
of  the  most  menial  service  to  the  high- 
wrought  schemes  by  which  the  highest  material 
interests  are  served,  are  under  the  whip  and  spur 
of  a  necessity  or  a  competition  which  suffers  no 
choice  and  no  cessation,  the  scholar  and  the  stu- 
dent are  indispensable.  The  preservation  of  a  lit- 
erature is  no  less  needful  than  its  growth,  and 
while  the  great  mass  of  educated  men  must  follow 
special  callings  and  professions  which  debar  them 
from  the  general  studies  and  researches  to  which 
their  tastes  invite,  it  is  a  satisfaction  to  know  that 
there  are  men  qualified  for  the  task  who  keep 
watch  over  the  sources  and  springs  of  literature, 
who  defend  it  from  what  is  unworthy, who  are  the 
custodians  of  its  treasures  and  the  guardians  of 
its  permanent  interests.  Their  service  is  not  con- 
spicuous and  may  be  lightly  esteemed,  for  it  is  not 
performed  on  a  wide  stage  nor  in  the  glare  of  com- 
petition. They  stay  by  the  supplies,  and  it  should 
be  ours  to  see  to  it  that  in  the  distribution  of  re- 
wards, "  as  his  part  that  goeth  down  to  the  battle 
so  shall  his  part  be  that  remaineth  by  the  stuff." 

It  may  seem  in  the  retrospect  of  the  life  1  have 
sketched  that  it  presents  a  character  without  a 
fault.  If  so  I  might  plead  the  grateful  prerogat  ve 
and  privilege  of  the  delineator  of  a  purely  private 
life  with  no  relation  to  public  events  imposing 
upon  the  biographer  the  duties  and  restraints 
which  attach  to  the  historian.  In  the  portrait  of  the 
friend  we  love  we  want  to  see  him  at  his  best,  and 
if  it  is  painted  by  the  hand  of  affection  it  may  well 
present  in  a  single  aspect  the  idea  of  all  that  was 
most  admirable  in  the  original.  The  famous 
speech  of  Cromwell  to  Sir  Peter  Lely,  "  paint  me 
as  I  am,"  may  have  been  only  the  shrewd  self- 
assertion  of  a  nature  which  imposed  its  rude  re- 
straint upon  whatever  was  adventitious  and  not 
within  the  compass  of  its  own  control.  And  yet 
if  I  were  charged,  as  on  the  oath  of  a  witness,  to 
testify  as  to  the  failings  of  this  subject  of  my 
sketch,  I  should  have  to  seek  for  them  outside 
of  any  knowledge  or  information  of  my  own. 

His  was  a  life  singularly  free  from  blemish  or 
blame  and  equally  exempt  from  enmity  or  detrac- 
tion. It  may  be  said  that  he  was  less  exposed  to 
temptation  by  reason  of  his  seclusion  from  the 
world,  but  while  the  praises  of  the  solitary  life  have 
been  often  set  forth  it  cannot  be  claimed  in  its  be- 
half that  the  infirmities  of  the  individual  man 
part  company  with  him  when  he  quits  the  society 
of  his  fellows.  He  who  mixes  least  with  the  world 
is  apt  to  have  the  worst  opinion  of  his  kind  and  to 
become  querulous  if  not  cynical,  just  as  the  citi- 
zen who  is  earliest  and  most  frequent  in  his  de- 
spair of  the  republic  is  usually  the  last  and  least 
serviceable  in  any  effort  for  its  rescue.  The  vo- 


1 4 


taries  ot  a  pure  literature  are  no  exception  to  the 
rule.  If  Cowper  fled  from  the  world  as  the  scene 
'•where  Satan  wages  still  his  most  success- 
ful war "  it  was  only  to  find  in  his  se- 
clusion new  inward  sources  of  conflict  and 
distress  from  which  a  closer  contact  with  the 
world  would  perhaps  have  been  the  best  safe- 
guard. But  our  friend,  in  his  self-chosen  home- 
life,  was  always  in  sympathy  with  the  world  with- 
out, thoroughly  patriotic  and  loyal  as  a  citizen 
and  most  genial  and  hearty  in  his  appreciation  of 
whatever  was  deserving  of  general  regard  and 
esteem.  Although  a  recluse  he  loved  the  city,  its 
nearness  to  his  quiet  nook  of  study,  the  concourse 
of  its  streets,  its  public  libraries  and  exhibitious  of 
art,  its  repositories  of  books  and  engravings,  its 
strong  and  busy  life.  He  was  never  willingly 
away  from  it.  A  day's  ramble  in  the  country  now 
and  then  sufficed  for  out-of-town  enioyments.  I 
could  never  persuade  him  to  pass  a  night  under 
my  suburban  roof.  Like  Madame  de  Stael,  who 
preferred  a  fourth  story  in  the  Rue  de  Bac  to  all 
the  glories  of  Switzerland,  he  kept  to  the  city  and 
shunned  a  change  even  in  midsummer  heats.  But, 
unlike  her.  his  choice  was  for  its  solitude  and  not 
for  its  society,  and  such  was  the  purity  of  his 
character  that  it  did  not  corrode  or  become  de- 
based by  being  hidden  from  the  light. 

He  is  buried  in  the  graveyard  at  Tarrytown,  be- 
side the  old  church  of  Sleepy  Hollow.  The  spot 
was  selected  by  himself  and  his  brother  long  ago 
as  a  place  of  family  burial  on  account  of  its  loveli- 
ness of  situation,  its  quaint  surroundings  and  the 
associations  which  have  been  woven  about  it  by  the 
master  hand  of  Irving,  whose  grave  is  near  his 
own,  Hard  by  this  rural  solitude,  along  the  iron 
pathway  which  skirts  it,  the  heavily  freighted 
trains  move  day  and  night,  and  eager  crowds  hurry 
to  and  fro  on  their  ceaseless  errands,  while  beyond 
on  the  broad  river  the  gathei-ed  fruits  of  the  corn- 
fields and  prairies  of  the  West  go  to  seek  a  market 
in  the  great  metropolis  or  beyond  the  sea.  In  this 
contrast  of  the  grave  with  its  unchanging  repose 
beside  the  restless,  rapid  movements  of  the  living 
we  may  find  an  image,  not  inapt,  of  the  life  we 
have  surveyed,  so  near  the  stir  and  rush-of  the  out- 
ward world  and  yet  in  its  calmness  and  serenity  so 
far  removed,  and  as  we  turn  from  the  peaceful 
life  and  the  quiet  grave  both  alike  are  bright  with 
the  best  memories  of  earth  and  the  smile  of  heaven. 


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